Welcome to our plot!

I'm Hazel, and in Nov 2006 my friend Jane and I took on a half plot at Hill Allotments, Sutton Coldfield - we want the satisfaction of growing and eating our own fruit and veg, and to improve our diet (and fitness!).

This is the story of what happened next...........

Sunday, March 04, 2007

Brilliant Broad Beans!

A really spring like morning up at the Hill yesterday – sunshine & showers! Today is a really contrast with rain all day.

Acting on my thoughts last week, I took the black plastic path sheets down to the Hill, along with the chitted Rocket potatoes, a couple of seed packets & a ball of string to measure the paths out with along with a box of chicken manure (£1.75, Wilko) to feed.

I thought that I’d try to put the paths in straight, so took the tape & had a measure up – an exercise which confirmed that laying the plots out by eye does not make for accuracy! The four ‘even size’ plots are in fact 10’, 10’, 10’ & 16’ which means that our potato plot is particulary generously proportioned.

I’m not altogether happy with the plastic paths – I suspect that when the soil that I’ve tucked the edges into dries out, they will have a tendency to fly off & it was only after I bought two packs of pegs with the intention of anchoring them down that I realised that the plastic will probably just move & rip.

I suppose that I could put a load of bark chippings on, or something? The advantage of these paths is that they are not a permanent feature of the plot, so that when we – inevitably – change our minds, it’s all moveable!

Before I dealt with that, however, I put in the second two rows of rocket potatoes, & scattered some of the chicken manure pellets over the two middle plots. I also sowed a short row of SPINACH (hector F1) & SPRING ONIONS (white lisbon).

The big news is that the broad beans are finally showing themselves – 6 loooong weeks after sowing! I was so excited about this, & the evidence of a few peas coming through that I did a little dance!

I met our neighbour at the back of the plot – David – who seems like a thoroughly nice chap, & we cleared up a bit of a demarcation issue with regard to who the big row of rhubarb belongs to between our two half plots. Just as well we hadn’t dug any of it up, as it’s his – however he’s said that we must help ourselves to as much as we want of it.

Jane & S spent a therapeutic afternoon sowing a whole heap of tomato seeds, along with sunflowers & she says that we’ll have far too many if they all grow! She’s sown 4 different varieties, but we don’t seem to have one which is suitable for hanging baskets which I’d like to try, so I’ll see if we can do a swap on the Grapevine.

Being geared up on the ‘pots’ front, I there’s a whole heap of brassica seeds that can be started off in pots (outside). Jane has also bought 4 asparagus crowns – yummy – we’ll have to prepare a bed for them up by the rhubarb/Jerusalem artichokes, I think.

I came home & sowed a trough of CARROT (paris market) which are little round ones & covered it over with some netting to keep the nosy mogs off.

It feels like it’s all systems go, now it’s March – so next weekend is shaping up nicely: